The conventional method of moving patients from their hospital bed to a wheeled stretcher or transfer unit and vice versa is to assemble a group of 4 to 6 orderlies and nurses and have them physically manipulate the patient from the bed to the stretcher. This operation must be duplicated with a new group of people when the patient is conveyed from the stretcher to a treatment table, for example, in X-ray procedures. This approach is not only extremely wasteful of the limited human resources available in the hospital and extremely disruptive of their other duties, but can be dangerous to the hospital personnel who must perform the awkward lifting operations and to the patient who may not be able to tolerate the twisting and jerking which would normally accompany the procedure.
Although there have been many attempts to mechanize this transfer operation, all have suffered from one or more major shortcomings. In particular, several of the devices use a lifting web which must be slid under the patient. This operation can be somewhat difficult for one person to accomplish and can be extremely painful for patients in delicate condition. Furthermore, many devices can only be unloaded on the same side as they are loaded. Since the most convenient side of the bed for loading may not be the same side as for unloading at the treatment table, either the hospital furniture must be moved around or the patient must be manipulated around on the stretcher. Either solution nullifies much of the value of the lifting device.
It is, therefore, an outstanding object of the invention to provide a mechanical lifting system adapted to transfer a patient from his hospital bed to a wheeled transfer unit.
Another object of this invention is the provision of a lifting device which can be operated by a single individual and which does not require any physical lifting by the operator.
A further object of the present invention is the provision of a lifting system which utilizes the patient's bed sheet as the lifting medium.
It is another object of the instant invention to provide a lifting system with which the transfer unit can be unloaded from the side opposite that at which it was loaded.
A still further object of the invention is the provision of a transfer unit which is simple to operate, relatively inexpensive to manufacture, and which is capable of a long and useful life with a minimum of maintenance.
With these and other objects in view, as will be apparent to those skilled in the art, the invention resides in the combination of parts set forth in the specification and covered by the claims appended hereto.